Well here goes.... JohnC had a engine built by Cadillac Performance Engineering probably close to 10 years ago. The engine was a legend in Cadillac circles. It was a high compression, solid lifter beast that was mated to a variety of gear drive ratios up to 2.68 and spinning about every blade ever made for push and power.

JohnC sold his boat a few years ago and the new owner had years of service without issue up until a slipped hose which caused a fatal overheat.

Well I'm gonna recycle this bitch and make it a Nitrous Oxide capable, high compression 519 retro-mod

John we are gonna keep that old girl laughing and thrusting HARD...lol

Turtle your ole 507 is working on being a legend out there in it's own right, all you gotta do is keep running that boat dry down the trail past those large groups of folks going "WTF" was that.....lol

awesome get er going son I remember my first time at Buddy's House when I walked in that shed and the Wife said oh hell we aint leaving without one of these engines LOL!!! I guess it was the look in my eye LOL!!!!

Thanks for posting the new build. Its nice to see that the old girl will live on and be better than ever. Sorry I ever sold that boat, but I had to help out my 80 year old mom at the time with a place to live. Family and priorities. When Buddy gets her finished maybe we can get together and go for a ride. Keep us posted.

Went by the shop on Friday and Buddy was starting the project. When he offered me the build, I was thinking of putting it together in a self described "Retro-Mod" fashion basically using your existing "Series 3" blueprint. Spoke to him yesterday and he had the block curing and he was suggesting that I consider using his newer GDR519 plans and go full roller with it. I'm torn because the old girl sure made the power as it was but with a full roller configuration the chance of hurting a cam or lifter really goes away. It won't make any more power it's just insurance and more oil pressure as the valve lash in the solid lifter cam on the shaft roller bleeds off.

What was your oil pressure at idle after running for a while?

I do a lot of low speed crawling looking for fish in the fall so I am trying to be a forward thinker.

SWAMPHUNTER45 wrote:This block is a rare late model version. I call it a "striations block" as the area around the motor mount is cast in a lined pattern.
It is a very unique block believed to come off a mold in 1975 or 1976, just a cool piece if your a Cadillac fan.

same as mine what is unique about lifter gallery? I know that the nickel content in my block is tremendous, I drilled a hole through the starter mount boss and it was like drilling stainless where as drilling cast iron is like butter.

Can't see the whole gallery, but I'm guessing based on the partial view, that Buddy has added six oil drain holes, as opposed to the more typical one big one centered in the back. (Seven if that is there as well)

I didn't know that such a 'striated' block was a rare, cool find. This is great news, as that means that most of my junk around here is worth more than I thought it was. I've never pulled a '5 or '6 that was not like that so I had always believed that all '75 and '76 blocks were that way. Maybe you just never got a late model one before?

Of the four 5200 blocks that I have here, three fit that profile. The lone, odd man out is the 472 on Lori's boat that came out of a '74 Deville. I never perceived it made any difference except that it takes a little longer to properly clean when you are prepping the block.

In any case, I always like learning a new word . . striated. Don't know where I'll ever use it, but it is accurately descriptive of the grooved under side of those mount bosses.

"The suppression of uncomfortable ideas may be common in religion and politics,
but it is not the path to knowledge; it has no place in the endeavor of science." - Carl Sagan

It also appears to be a slightly thicker casting in the mount area. I had heard rumor GM was playing around with their metallurgy in preparation for the 425 pour but this much like the 10 and 20 code SBC blocks is not documented.

Don't know about anything that GM may have or may not have been doing. Back in those days, I was a Ford guy and spent my time and effort toward that end.

Out of curiosity, I went and looked at my 425 mock-up block and it is smooth like the early 5200s. They are different in a number of different ways (in an effort to loose weight), but the motor mount bosses are not striated, and like the original 5200s.

"The suppression of uncomfortable ideas may be common in religion and politics,
but it is not the path to knowledge; it has no place in the endeavor of science." - Carl Sagan

With all the metal they took out of the 425 and the need to maintain structural integrity and as the story goes Cadillac wanted to ensure a molten compound that would flow totally absent of voids. GM for a long while was a divided company and the Cadillac engineers were free to do their own thing, very different from the Ford operation that was united across the brand. Some speculate that the late blend Cadillac alloy is actually still used today by GM Performance in production of the Bow Tie performance Chevrolet blocks.

Probably will be a few weeks before we can get the pistons in and cam on the degree wheel as we are chasing some components.

The Howard Cams retro fit roller lifters arrived. I have used these before in the 514 build that is now on Blu's boat and they worked very well. For those of you who may not understand the difference between a flat tappet or retro-fit lifter I will post a pic and give a brief explanation.

A flat tappet lifter is a metal cylinder that "slides" over the top of a cam lobe. As it slides up the lobe the pushrod opens the valve and then as it goes down the lobe the valve closes. A limitation to the cams ability is the lobe profile as if made to steep the cam lobe will be pointed and cause excessive wear. A typical flat tappet lifter must also spin in its lifter bore to prevent uneven wear so a traditional cam lobe is ground with a slight angle to promote spin.

The roller lifter is a lifter that utilizes a wheel on the bottom which reduces friction as now the lifter simply rolls over the newly designed cam lobe. This offers the ability to run a much steeper ramp speed and taller lift profile. When doing this in an older vintage engine it requires a "retro-fit" lifter. As the "slider" lifter was designed to spin in it's bore the roller lifter must be kept in alignment so the wheel can roll over the cam lobe. This is accomplished by the manufacturer joining the two lifters together in a retro-fit application by use of a "link bar" which keeps the pair in the correct alignment. Modern engines such as the LS3 platform were designed for roller camshafts and utilize a lifter bucket to maintain correct orientation.

There are unique limitations with a retro-fit link bar as it relates to extreme applications but currently we have been able to run lifts in the 630 range with wide LSA's without conflict. This retro-fit concept is used in all the older engines when a roller conversion is desired. When doing the conversion other valve train components and upgrades are required such as stronger valve springs, shaft rockers and custom HD push rods as the roller cam really pops opens and slams the valves closed faster. This affords the engine enhanced performance as the roller cam can open the valve faster and keep it open longer as it is not restricted out of concern for the lobe profile.

Dropped them off at the shop today and Mr Branch said CompCams had mailed him the cam card and invoice so we should have a custom ground roller cam arriving next week if all goes as planned. He was setting ring gaps today so progress is slow but steady.
Al has talked me into taking the 542 off and giving the GDR519 a test. It won't be a pretty engine (no bling) but I am hopeful it will be a strong runner.

It started out as a salvage of JohnC's former engine for a budget back up, retro flat tappet solid lifter 11:1 brute. It has morphed into a GDR542 build. My wallet is hurting and the wife is giving me the evil eye but I have offset costs by selling some of my aluminum heads.

New engine is purpose built for 2:37 to 2.68 gear drive with 4x S or R blade set up.

SWAMPHUNTER45 wrote: My wallet is hurting and the wife is giving me the evil eye but I have offset costs by selling some of my aluminum heads.

.

Just remind your wife that it is cheaper to run an airboat than it is to run a wife (and less trouble)

So, tell her, don't be going making you make a choice

Dang, that is a nice lookin motor.... don't ya just love those freshly machined parts... cant wait to hear how it goes

I was told I was wrong, once (not sure I believe it though)
If you can't blind 'em with brilliance, baffle 'em with BS
Airboat experience so far, limited to having bolted a gyrocopter to a flat bottom punt.... but THAT.... is about to change, bigtime